Need Linux partitioning advice

[lightwo]

I've been meaning to toy with various devices capable of running Linux (e.g. PS3, Wii U), but ran into a dilemma.

Many experienced Linuxers are aware of the idea of home partitions. I'd like to take advantage of it to map one disk like this:

[Install 1] | [Install 2] | [Install ...] | [ Shared home ]

My idea is that no matter how many devices I end up making Linux installs for, I can rest assured that I can store big files without buying a ton of HDDs.

Should I worry about separating something else (e.g. very bloated /usr)? Are there any obvious shortcomings with my idea?

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As an additional question, is it possible to do something like this?

/dev/sda contains /home and /bin, and I want to mount them accordingly, but normally partitions can be mounted to just one directory. I want to have one partition with both and be able to mount them somehow.

 

[lightwo]

Well, I partially answered my own question. As for the latter, it is possible to make a mount point:

UUID=... /mnt/shared ext4 defaults 0 2

...followed by binds:

/mnt/shared/home /home none bind

...but I ended up not utilising this since I remembered that I could simplify it with symbolic links and whatnot.